The Only Black Girls in Town

by Brandy Colbert

  I stare at her. “Three-way calling?”

  “It’s like a conference call, except you had to…” She stops, shaking her head. “It’s not important. I’m a dinosaur. What I’m trying to say is that these feelings and these… hard times won’t last forever. After what you’ve told me, I’m pretty certain this has everything to do with something Laramie is going through and nothing to do with you.”

  “It just seems like she’s too cool for me now,” I say. “And she’s hanging out with someone she knows is mean to me.”

  “It can be hard to make sense of why people do what they do. Sometimes I don’t think the people doing it even understand. But my best friend and I recovered from that god-awful fight, and I’m pretty sure you and Laramie will be okay, too.”

  Denise sounds so sure of it, but I’m worried she’s wrong. Laramie and I haven’t even had a real fight, and somehow, that seems even worse.

  The next morning, after we stuff ourselves at the hotel restaurant with strawberry pancakes, we pack up our things and drive to the commune.

  “Have you been here since the time I came with you?” I ask when we get there.

  Dad puts the car in park at the end of a long drive that wound us through dense patches of trees. “Nope. That was the last time—when you were about five. We were heading down to see Denise and stopped on the way.”

  “It was exactly the same,” Elliott says, staring up at the large white farmhouse in front of us. “Almost all the same people were here.”

  “I haven’t been since I left eleven years ago.” Denise follows his gaze.

  A small white man with a balding patch on top of his head and wire-rimmed glasses that sit on the edge of his nose comes out of the house. “Hey there, can I help you?”

  “Oh, hello.” Dad smiles at him. “We were looking for Kent.”

  The man frowns. “Kent?”

  “Yeah, he kind of runs the place?” Elliott pauses. “Or, he used to.”

  “I’m sorry, are you looking for one of our writers in residence?”

  Dad, Elliott, and Denise all exchange looks with one another.

  “Is this not the Abstraction?”

  It surprises me to hear Elliott call the commune by its name. They almost never do. It’s usually just “Ojai” or “the space.”

  “No, this is a writers’ residency,” the man says, pushing his glasses up on his nose. “You’re not looking for the artists who used to live here?”

  “That’s exactly who we’re looking for,” Elliott says.

  The man shakes his head. “They’ve been gone for about two years now. We bought the property from them after a bad round of fires in the area. Said they didn’t want to worry about it anymore. But the place was just about empty, anyway. There couldn’t have been more than four or five people living here, including the owners.”

  “Kent sold the place?” Denise whispers.

  Dad is blinking listlessly at the farmhouse, and Elliott’s mouth hangs open.

  “Sorry to break the news,” the man says. “Didn’t seem like an easy decision for the owners.”

  “How could he just sell it and not even tell us? We could’ve said good-bye,” Dad mutters.

  “Happy to let you look around if you’d like,” the man offers. “I can’t interrupt the writers in their cabins, but you’re free to walk around the main house and the property. We did some upgrades, but…”

  They all look at one another again and collectively shake their heads.

  “No, but thank you. We appreciate it,” Elliott says.

  With his hands in his pockets, the man nods and watches us get back in the car.

  “I was going to bring the baby here one day,” Denise says in a voice so soft I can barely hear her.

  At the last turn before the house disappears from sight, I look back at the man with glasses. He’s still watching us. He looks like a tiny pin in front of the big white farmhouse.

  On the way home, I see a sign for Santa Barbara through my sleepy eyes. That wakes me right up.

  “Can we stop in Santa Barbara?”

  “Hungry again already? I guess I could eat,” Dad says. “Why don’t we stop for a snack?”

  “Actually… there’s something I wanted to see… for school.” I look between the three of them, not landing on one face for too long in case they figure out I’m lying. “A place someone used to work.”

  “Is this for the profile you told me about?” Denise asks.

  “Mm-hmm.”

  “I’m impressed with how seriously you’re taking this,” she says, and again, I feel bad about lying to her. But not bad enough to get into Constance’s whole story. I’m sort of afraid that once I tell them about her, they’ll figure everything out before Edie and I can. And we’re so close. I want us to do this by ourselves.

  I get out my phone and look up the address to Schiff’s Department Store. There’s no website, but there are a ton of reviews, and pages of pictures featuring the old-fashioned sign out front.

  Once we exit the freeway, I read Dad the address and he plugs it into his GPS. I feel itchy with excitement and nerves as I listen to the automated voice tell him to turn left and then right and then right again. We’re only a couple of miles away.

  When we pull up in front of the store, I almost expect it to be haloed in a bright light, or for there to be a sign posted in the window that says WELCOME, ALBERTA: WE’VE BEEN WAITING. The mystery of Constance is starting to feel like a scavenger hunt, and what better place to find the final clue than where she spent so much time and could almost be herself?

  The storefront looks different from the old-timey pictures online, but the big red oval sign is still the same. Dad, Elliott, and Denise peer out the window.

  “This is the place?” says Dad.

  “Yeah, can I go in?”

  Elliott gets out with me while Dad and Denise circle the block to find parking. But as soon as I start to open the door, I can tell something’s off. Through the big plate-glass windows, I can see that the store is almost empty. Mostly bare clothing racks have been pushed to the sides of the store, and the tables in the center are nearly as empty, with just a few sad-looking sweaters and pairs of pants folded on top.

  “What’s going on here?” Elliott uses his hand as a visor to block the reflection on the glass.

  “This,” I say, pointing. There’s a sign, all right. But it’s not welcoming me. It says:

  GOING OUT OF BUSINESS

  ALL SALES FINAL

  The door is unlocked, so I push it open and we walk in.

  “Hello,” a red-haired woman says from her spot behind the register. She’s perched on a stool, reading a book. “We’re down to the last of our inventory, but if you want it, it’s yours.”

  “You’re closing?”

  “Yup.” She slides her finger between the pages of her book to mark her place. “After seventy-five years in business. We couldn’t compete with the online world anymore.”

  “What a shame,” Elliott says, shaking his head. “This looks like it was a nice place. I miss department stores.”

  The woman gives us a sad smile. “I wish more people missed department stores. Can I help you find anything?”

  “Actually.” I step forward. “I was wondering if you might know anything about people who worked here a long time ago.”

  “I’ve been here fifteen years. Try me.”

  “No, I mean a really long time ago. Like, back in the fifties.”

  “Oh.” She slides off the stool, abandoning her book. “Well, I’m not quite that old, but the business has been in my family since it opened. What’s the name?”

  I clear my throat, suddenly embarrassed. We’re the only three people in the store, but I feel as if I’m standing in a spotlight and have one chance to get my speech right. “Well, two people, actually. Do you know someone named Constance?”

  “Constance?” She frowns, and I hold my breath, hoping she’ll snap her fingers and say Of course! She wa
s like part of the family. But she bites her lip and shakes her head. “The name doesn’t sound familiar.”

  “What about a woman named May?”

  Her face brightens. “May? May Schiff was my great-aunt.”

  My mouth drops open. “Seriously?”

  “Seriously.” She looks at me curiously. “How do you know her?”

  “I don’t. I mean, it’s a long story, but I sort of know someone she knew.… Constance. And I’m trying to find out more about her.”

  “Oh, well.” The sad smile is back. “I’m afraid Aunt May can’t help you. She passed just last year.”

  No. No, no, no. Not after the phone call with Rosemary McCrimmons turned up nothing. Not when I’m this close to finding someone who knew Constance in real life.

  “I’m sorry, honey. Most of that generation is gone. But my father worked here when he was younger, and so did his brothers. I’m sure they’d be happy to talk to you for…?”

  “It’s for a school project. A profile.” I’ve said it so many times now, even I’m starting to believe it’s true.

  “I could give them your number if you want?” She looks at Elliott to check.

  He nods and nudges me, but I shake my head. “No, it’s okay, thank you.”

  “Are you sure, Al? This project sounds really important.”

  “Well, I think May is the only one who could have helped me… but okay.” I figure it can’t hurt. Just in case. “Thank you.”

  The woman takes my name and number and promises to give it to her family. As I look at her, I think about how May told Constance she was mulatto, which used to be a word to describe half-black, half-white people, but is offensive now. Just like the word Negro, which Constance used in her journals. And if May was her great-aunt, that means somewhere in her past, this woman has black relatives, too. Which is hard to believe, with her pale skin and auburn hair. I wonder if she knows about her family’s history.

  Dad and Denise are still circling when we walk back out. They pull over when they see us and look back as we slide in.

  “Well?” Denise says.

  I shake my head. “The woman I need to talk to died.”

  “Sorry, sweetheart,” Dad says with sympathetic eyes. “Pretty disappointing day for all of us, huh?”

  I don’t look back at the store as we leave. I don’t want a memory of how close I came to finding out the truth.

  EWING BEACH

  LATER, ONCE WE’RE HOME AND HAVE EATEN DINNER and I’ve said good night, I sit cross-legged on my floor with Constance’s journals. I have five more, and since Edie didn’t care, I looked through the years in the remaining stack and picked the last ones.

  I thought a few of the books might be only half-full, deserted midway through, which has happened to me each time I’ve tried to start a journal. But every single page of them is filled with her writing. She kept them all through the sixties. There are a lot of pages.

  I flip through 1961, 1964, 1966. I stop every few pages and scan for something about her living in a new town, going back to San Francisco, or talking to her family or Sanford down South. But there’s only Constance recapping her years in Santa Barbara and her friendship with May, who never gave up her secret.

  She loved it there. She worked at the department store, hung out with her friends, and spent a lot of time at the beach. When I get to those parts, I think about the old Gidget TV show. It was probably made around the same time Constance was writing in her journals, and I wonder if she ever got on a surfboard. She talked about going on dates sometimes, but she was worried about getting too serious in case she had to tell someone her secret and they ended up breaking things off—or worse, revealing it to everyone.

  But then I get to someone she called J. She said she hadn’t felt that way about anyone since she was with Sanford back home. She called some people by their initials and others by their first names, but she never wrote his out. He was just J.

  I stretch out my legs and lean my back against the bed. My eyes start to droop at the end of 1967, but I keep pushing on through the last one: 1968. I smile through a yawn when I read that J proposed marriage to Constance. They had a small civil ceremony at the courthouse with just his family. I figure the next entry is going to talk about having babies, because all of her friends are getting married and having babies. Even May, whose only child, they were both relieved to see, turned out lighter than his mother. But instead—

  “Oh my god!” I sit up and gasp. Rub my eyes, because it’s late and the ink is faint on the page. Maybe I’m not reading this right.

  April 11, 1968

  J and I have made one of the biggest decisions of our lives.

  We are quitting our jobs, moving up the coast, and buying a house. But not just any house—a bed and breakfast! In a sweet little tourist town called Ewing Beach. The real estate agent said it’s the perfect place to start a family.

  I’ve never owned anything so big or important in my life.

  M. McCrimmons never could have owned something so big or important. But I left her behind a long time ago.

  And now, no one can ever force me to move out of their house again. I will have my own home. My home I share with J.

  Love, C

  I reread it again and again and again, but the words never change. And I can’t believe them.

  Because it looks like Constance was a whole lot closer than I thought this entire time.

  BARNEY

  I’M FINISHING UP A LATE BREAKFAST WITH MY DADS and Denise on Monday morning when the doorbell rings.

  I jump up right away, hoping it’s Edie. I was planning to walk over later. I’ve been trying to get ahold of her since last night, but she’s not returning my texts or answering her phone. I keep looking at the B&B, trying to see some movement from her tiny attic window, but I don’t see any sign of her being home. Ms. Whitman’s car isn’t in the driveway.

  But when I open the door, Oliver is standing on the porch in his wet suit, surfboard propped up next to him.

  “Hey, Alberta. I’m heading down to the beach. Want to come?”

  What I really want to do is talk to Edie immediately, but I can never say no to surfing. Especially on a day off from school. I’ve barely had time to go in the ocean since surf camp ended, and just watching isn’t enough. I miss it deep in my bones.

  “Let me check with my dads,” I say, but before I can even turn around, Elliott calls out, “Fine with us!”

  Fifteen minutes later, Oliver and I are walking down to the beach in the chilly morning air. I can already tell it’s been too long since I was in the water because my arm starts cramping right away from holding my board.

  “Your dads seem pretty cool,” Oliver says as we walk along.

  “They are pretty cool. I mean, for dads,” I add quickly.

  “Denise was nice, too. She looks really pregnant.” He seems a bit concerned.

  “Yeah, I think she’s going to have the baby soon.”

  “Is that weird for you?”

  I start to answer and then stop, because it hits me that this is the first time anyone has ever asked what it feels like for me that Denise is having another baby. Edie asked what’s it like with her around, but not what it’s like that she’s having another child. I don’t know how Oliver knew I needed that question—I didn’t even know I needed it—but it makes me feel like he’s pretty cool, too.

  “Kind of? I mean, I’m happy for her and Tim. But it is weird. The baby is technically going to be my half sister or half brother. Except not really.”

  Oliver shrugs. “I don’t know. I don’t think it has to be so weird. More family is better than not enough, right?”

  I think of Constance, alone in California all those years ago and missing her family. “Yeah… I guess you’re right.”

  “Did you do anything this weekend?”

  I tell him about our trip to Ojai, leaving out the stop in Santa Barbara. Oliver already knows about the commune, but it doesn’t bother me when he asks
questions. I tell him about the farmhouse and the open land and how sad my dads and Denise were when they found it wasn’t the same place they used to live.

  “That sounds like a bummer.”

  “It was, a little bit. But we also stayed in a fancy hotel and I got a mani-pedi and a massage, so it wasn’t all bad.”

  “So bougie,” Oliver teases.

  “The bougiest.”

  “Well, that sounds like more fun than my weekend. My dad made me spend all of Saturday and most of yesterday after church doing soccer drills so I can get ready for the season.”

  I frown. “But soccer doesn’t start until the spring, right?”

  He rolls his eyes. “Like that matters to my dad. It’s not even a question to him if I’m going to make the team. He wants me to be the best so I can make varsity with the eighth graders.”

  “Do you want to play with the eighth graders?” I shudder at the thought.

  But Oliver grins. “How else will I get them to respect me?”

  The beach is crowded with local families, the sun is bright, and the lifeguards are on high alert since they know schools are out for the day, scanning the water with their whistles at the ready. It takes us a while to find a good spot, but once we do, we climb down the dunes, drop our boards, and do some stretches before we head out to the water.

  I’m sitting with my right leg long and my forehead touching my knee, breathing in the salty air and thinking what a perfect morning this is when the shrillest voice cuts through the peaceful ocean waves.

  “Look, Shauna—it’s the best surfer in all of Ewing Beach Surf Camp!”

  I don’t even have to lift my head to know it’s Nicolette. I don’t think anyone else’s voice could be drenched in that much sarcasm. I look up to find them standing over me with their arms crossed.

  I think of Dad’s advice to just ignore her ignorant comments. But then I think about how she invaded my perfect day, and my anger takes over.